


Operation Camping and Sex: A Scheme

by zlot



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Camping, First Time, Humor, Multi, Threesome - F/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-31
Updated: 2010-05-31
Packaged: 2017-10-09 19:47:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/90899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zlot/pseuds/zlot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Academy-era. Jim is McCoy's common-law wife; Gaila just thinks he's hot. Together they hatch a scheme to cheer Bones up. Camping-related hijinks ensue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Operation Camping and Sex: A Scheme

**Author's Note:**

  * For [screamlet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/screamlet/gifts).



> This fic is absolutely absurd and even I'm not really sure what to make of it, but that's okay because it is wholly and irrevocably a gift for screamlet's one-year trekaversary, and with gifts it's the thought that counts. (Right?) She dragged me into this fandom by the ear and has brought me a lot of joy ever since. This is my first Trek fic and it's dedicated to her.

It begins, unsurprisingly, with Jim getting elbowed in the face.

He can't exactly blame Bones, who has told Jim about a million times that he doesn't like being snuck up on, thanks a bunch. He knows it, but that doesn't stop him from tiptoeing up behind McCoy in the Academy library and blowing a thin stream of air into his ear.

After elbow connects sharply with Jim's eyebrow region, McCoy doesn't exactly apologize -- in point of fact he calls Jim "you little shit" no less than three times in the immediate aftermath -- but he hovers about examining Jim's face, which isn't even bleeding, so he knows Bones feels bad.

"Will I get a shiner?" Jim asks happily.

Bones rolls his eyes and mutters something about Jim being a "fucking miniaturized thug," which barely even makes sense, but he looks less guilty and that's the point.

Jim tells Gaila about the incident over dinner. She's been helping him study for his computer science final, which is smart because no one else knows that shit like she does, and is dumb because being around Gaila makes all the blood in Jim's brain flee straight for his dick. At first she clearly enjoyed her effect on him, but once she realized how counterintuitive computers were to Jim, she relented and advised him to start wearing a surgical mask during encounters that lasted more than an hour to block her pheromones, which kind of worked (?) if he didn't look at her boobs.

"I don't understand," Gaila says. "You must be infuriating to live with all the time, but Leonard probably doesn't 'accidentally' punch you that often."

Jim smiles a bit at the ceiling and says, "Well, you don't know about the Cycle." 

When she doesn't request clarification, he continues, "OK, so Bones and I have been roommates for two years now? Except for those 17 days he moved in with Gary because, and I quote, 'A man can only take so goddamn much.' And over that time I've learned some things about how he operates. He's got a cycle, kind of like a lady."

"A human lady."

"Sure. Wait," Jim leans forward. "What do you mean, human ladies? What about -- "

"Jim, your previous lack of curiosity about Orion anatomy is not my concern." She smiles widely, and Jim finds himself momentarily distracted from green cleave by her dimples, which are equally enticing, if more subtle. "What's McCoy's cycle?"

"Why so curious?"

"Can't I just be a fan of his bedside manner?" Gaila asks archly. Jim opens his mouth, but she grins and barrels on. "No, really. He's been a big help with my back problems, and he's very virile, don't you think? Does he have a large penis?"

Jim closes his mouth, opens it, and decides to skip back a bit and answer an earlier question. "Anyway, apart from the one week a month where he basically has his period, Tuesdays he vids his daughter, so he's usually in a pretty good mood right afterwards, but sad at night. At the beginning of each month he gets a Georgia care package from his family, so he's cheery and drunk for a while. Whiskey's usually gone by the 16th of the month, which isn't the best time. The entire period between Thanksgiving and Christmas is a complete no-go. Hates it."

Gaila frowns. "Because of his daughter."

"Yeah. Now, May is a big shitstorm because finals usually happen around the same time as his wedding anniversary. So only someone criminally stupid would blow in McCoy's ear in May." Jim gives Gaila his most winning smile, but she's looking into the space above his left shoulder, still frowning a bit.

"I don't like it," she says briskly. "You know him very well, but you've still admitted defeat. There's got to be a better way of cheering him up than letting him give you a black eye -- though I'm sure it will look very dashing," she says in a consolatory tone.

They try to come up with a better plan, but they're finished eating and Jim may actually fail his exam, so their conversation turns to coding, after they both promise to think about it.

\--

Jim does come up with a plan, and so does Gaila. Gaila's plan, unsurprisingly, is entirely sex-based. Jim's is more innovative, and thus wins, though it's Gaila's masterstroke to combine the two.

The last week of finals, Jim corners Bones, who is hunched over the messiest desk in all creation, and tells him, "We're going camping this weekend."

"Not unless," McCoy growls, "you're using some new definition of the word 'we' I'm not familiar with."

This is actually more of a response than Jim expected, given the slump of McCoy's shoulders, so he doesn't give up.

"Bones," he says, going for a Captain Pike authoritative vibe, "this is really happening. I have a tent. I have sleeping bags." (This is untrue. He has one really, really big sleeping bag, commissioned specifically for Phase Gaila of the plan. Buying it from a 17-year-old gum-chewing girl employee of the outdoor supply store fulfilled his Awkwardness Quota for the entire year.) "I am going to requisition a metric fuckton of marshmallows, in due course."

McCoy swivels around. "Remember that time you told me we were going fishing? I ended up in the worst strip club in all of California, or rather in its _parking lot_ while you finished up with Candy. What do you really mean this time?"

"_Camping_, Bones," Jim whines, dropping the Pike voice for his own natural wheedle. "You know I'm a country boy. I want to, you know, make a fire with my bare hands, and look at the stars, and... tie food to tree branches because of bears."

McCoy swivels back towards his precarious stack of anatomical textbooks. "Gotta be someone else who wants to go sing Kumbaya with you, Jim. Go find him, her, or it, okay?"

"None of those people have medical degrees. Did I mention bears?" Bones is silent. "Bears. Poisonous berries. Nonpoisonous berries that I'm probably allergic to. And not an anti-toxin kit for miles."

McCoy still isn't saying anything, though his shoulders tell Jim's practiced eyes that he's thinking about it, or at least thinking about Jim dying, and -- thank God -- not with gleeful anticipation. Jim rests a hand on McCoy's shoulder (though he keeps his face safely out of elbow range, just in case).

"Aaand... I know what this weekend is," Jim says, quietly. "And I know you need a distraction, and maybe we really can go fishing next time, because swear-to-God I'm trying to grow up a little."

Jim feels something untwist and slump in McCoy's shoulder, which means that Bones is going to say yes in the next ten minutes or so. In the end it only takes six more minutes, and two well-placed _c'moooooonnnnn_'s.

\--

Jim scrapes a B- in his computer final and rewards himself by resting his hands a little lower than is strictly necessary during Gaila's congratulatory hug.

"Okay," she says, disentangling herself with a knowing grin and shaking back her curls, "he's in?"

"He's in. He's tried back out a couple of times, but he gave me his word and luckily Southern honor is good for something."

"It can't just be the three of us," Gaila muses, "way too obvious. But we can't invite people who will be too excited about all those human customs you told me about, eating some ores or whatever, or I won't be able to get him alone. At least not if I want to be," she wrinkles her nose, "subtle."

Gaila sighs, smiles, pecks Jim on the cheek, and chirps, "Leave it to me."

"They're called s'mores!" he shouts after her.

Jim, meanwhile, trades in favors with the locals to secure something authentic as transportation, which turns out to be a 20th century vintage automobile -- not the sleek kind favored by Jim's stepdad, though. It's a big, clunky beast, the least aerodynamic vehicle imaginable, something called a "VW bus," which luckily has been modified enough to work. The inside smells a little like spilled beer, so that's familiar.

In the end Gaila keeps their camping crew intimate -- she invites a couple she knows, two engineers named Dave and Jorge, and her roommate, who turns out to be the hottie from the bar in Riverside, No First Name Uhura, and things would be getting all _kinds_ of interesting for Jim, except Uhura in turn is dragging along some Russian kid, command track, Jim can't remember his name but he's pretty sure Uhura's looking at hard time on one of the prison planets if she tries anything.

Everyone shows up with their gear and loads it into the bus with the requisite number of snide comments about their ride -- except for the jailbait, who tries to tell him that VWs are traditional Russian "wehicles." Bones is the last to arrive, wearing a gigantic, hideous backpack and carrying a container. He doesn't look very excited, but he refrains from insulting what Jim, out of pure self-defense, has decided to call the Pimpmobile.

"What's in the bowl?" Jim asks as McCoy settles into the seat next to him. A pre-emptive shotgun call was part of their agreement.

"Beans," Bones says.

\--

The kids in the back are in high spirits, having finished another year of training, and a bottle of wine appears to be going around, but Jim focuses his attention on Bones, whose face seems to get gradually less pinched the further they get from San Francisco.

Actually, Jim must be gazing a bit too much, because McCoy notices and starts in on his safe driving lecture, the highlight of which is "_ten o'clock and two o'clock,_ you ass." It's as familiar as breathing and Jim just smiles and smiles and drives with his knees and waits for the outraged yelp.

The Pimpmobile arrives, in due course, at their campsite, which is in a state park an hour or so outside of town. "All right," Jim announces, "you've all got tents, yeah? Put them up now, it's easy to put it off and then the sun's down and you're fucked. Bones, you can help me make the fire."

"How come?" a voice says, and Uhura pokes her head out from the backseat. "I can't make a fire? Or Gaila? Do our vaginas render us incapable?"

"Yep, I am in fact a caveman, haven't you heard?" Jim says. "I mean, if I had my way we'd be eating the hot dogs raw. And grunting, _so_ much grunting."

She sticks out her tongue and climbs out of the bus.

\--

"Well," McCoy says.

Jim cringes.

"I mean, I did get the impression, Jim -- and forgive me if I'm wrong, here -- but you did imply that you'd done this before."

"Lighter fluid. Lots," Jim protests. "What about you, Georgia? I guess you're a doctor, not a Boy Scout, right?"

"In my experience, this is usually how it works. You start out with lots of confidence and end up emasculated with a bunch of lightly toasted sticks. Dammit."

"This is all getting a bit Jack London. They're going to start demanding food soon."

"And your balls on a plate."

"I _need_ those."

"I need to heat up these beans, is what I need to do," says Bones. "We're going to have to suck it the hell up and ask for help. I bet Ms. Gender Equality back there knows all about it, can just rub two sticks together."

Jim opens his mouth to make a lewd comment when he sees Russian Kid skulking around, eyeing their pile of sticks with a critical eye.

"Hey, man," Jim calls, "you got any experience? I bet fires are super important in Russia, what with the cold and the... eating of potatoes, and all."

The kid's eyes light up like a supernova and he starts explaining about how to make a "leetle cottage for the fire to live in," and it turns out his name is Pavel and he's a fire _genius_ and there's a pretty good blaze going before long.

\--

Booze starts circulating as the food cooks, and before long McCoy is giving them all all a speech about the origin of the family beans.

"This recipe doesn't start with me," he says. "Oh no."

"Oh no!" Jim and Uhura chorus.

"Generation after generation of McCoys, back and back into the dawn of recorded..." Bones pauses. "_McCoyhood_..."

Gaila giggles around a mouthful of beans. "Do they have mint in them?" Jim asks.

"Do they have -- NO. God, Jim, I try to introduce you to a little Georgia culture once and the only effect it has on your peabrain is this lasting conviction that we only make things with mint in them."

"Mint juleps, guys," Jim tells the group. "I'm a convert."

"There is," Bones continues, a touch smugly, "a secret ingredient, though."

"It's alcoholic, yes?" Pavel asks. "But not wodka."

Bones frowns a little and says that Pavel might be on the right track. Everyone falls silent and rolls beans around their mouth for a bit and nods.

"He should try wodka," Pavel says under his breath.

\--

"Jim," McCoy hisses, sitting on one of the campsite's wooden benches, "I just realized something."

"Congratulations?"

"This is a couples' trip! Dave and Jorge, you and Gaila, Uhura and her goddamn statutory rape victim -- what the hell, Jim? You didn't tell me I'm the attending VD physician for a bunch of sex-starved..." McCoy looks like he's searching for the worst word he knows. "_Undergraduates_."

"What? Bones," Jim says, "no. Coincidence. Besides, there's no me and Gaila. I mean, not that I'm not working on it. I am. Working on it."

"How hard can it be? She already asked me to pass the ketchup, and oh by the way, what _positions_ do I prefer?"

"I'm playing it cool, Bones," Jim whines. "Just because a girl happens to be an Orion doesn't mean you just... hop on."

"Yeah, you're a real paragon of smooth."

"You'd know," Jim says, grinning. "You want to hop on this."

"Oh Lord, this again."

"You think I'd bring a date on our camping trip? Believe me, Bones, I am totally here as your committed common-law wife." Which is a bad choice of words, since Bones grimaces a little and remembers what day it is, which means Jim has no choice but to lever himself into his roommate's lap and try to get his head into the crook of Bones's neck, which he can't do because Bones is wriggling like an eel and pushing back and -- yes, there it is, thank fuck -- laughing, his gruff snorts registering as air against Jim's forehead, and Jim relaxes imperceptibly, at least until Bones shoves him off his lap onto the ground.

"No, no!" says Gaila, who is standing a few feet away and bouncing a bit on the balls of her feet, which causes the bobble atop her fucking knitted hat to jiggle. It's pink and clashes with her hair, but mostly it's adorable. "Keep going. I liked it."

"What? You liked seeing me get knocked on my ass by my best friend?" Jim asks, raising himself on one elbow. "I know you missed his library TKO earlier this week, but Jesus."

"You're fine," Gaila says, plopping down on the grass next to Jim. He rests his head against her thigh, and she in turn companionably settles against McCoy's knees. "I meant that I'm very interested in human male pair bonding. So homoerotic, and yet I take it the custom is _not_ to have sex? Weird."

Jim knows that if he says nothing Bones will sputter for a while, so he closes his eyes and grins a bit, waiting.

\--

Jim is glad, like _really_ glad, that Gaila didn't invite anyone who would bring along a guitar and try to lead them in a half-hearted singalong. But scary stories seem like a must, so here they are roasting the 'mallow and listening to Pavel's account of Alexei the Flesh-Eating Golem of Moscow.

Then Dave tells the stupid story that absolutely everyone has heard about an escaped convict with a hook for a hand -- everyone except Gaila, because apparently it hasn't hit the Orion campfire circuit yet, and her appreciative gasps redeem it for everyone else.

Then Gaila launches into her own tale, which isn't exactly scary or even, Jim suspects, fictional, but it does have the merit of being very, very inappropriate.

McCoy -- surprise, surprise -- holds back until Jim has wheedled and threatened until his face turns blue, but it's worth it because McCoy is a genuinely good storyteller. Even Uhura's sophisticated smirk drops away as McCoy gets going, and Jim smiles as he sees her leaning forward despite herself.

Actually, Jim isn't really focusing on the story so much as Bones's voice (how much bourbon have they had? Probably too much) quietly holding forth in his low, husky drawl. Jim feels a familiar sensation creep over him as he listens, which is kind of like -- pride? "A man is known by the company he keeps," that's what his mom used to say, usually because Jim was associating with various hood rats and she was taking it personally, but Bones -- how'd he get someone like Bones to be friends with him? It's finally gotten to the point where Jim knows that no matter what he does to piss Bones off, he's not leaving. That level of trust is new, and weirdly enough, kind of scary. 

"But whatever happened to the infant," McCoy says, almost in a whisper, and Jim straightens up, waiting for his cue, "or its unfortunate mother, well. No one has ever yet found out."

Beat.

"WHERE'S MY BABY?" Jim shrieks, and everyone jumps about a mile in the air, screams, starts swearing at him, laughs to break the tension, and McCoy is smiling down into the fire looking embarrassed and pleased with himself and Jim is just so fucking glad they came.

\--

"Okay," says Jim, as their ragtag little group appears to be wrapping up festivities for the evening, picking up graham cracker wrappers and drifting towards their tents, "looks like it's your turn."

Gaila looks at him for a moment, her face unreadable. "You don't sound thrilled," she says, finally.

Jim just feels tired, maybe a little hollow. "Are you kidding? I put a lot of work into this. The giant sleeping bag of love is all set up, and I don't expect he'll kick up too much of a fuss as long as you insist this wasn't all my idea."

Gaila puts her elbows on Jim's shoulders and her hands on the top of his head. "Jim," she murmurs, "are you jealous?"

"Oh, God!" Jim laughs. "I'm furious. But slow and steady wins the race. I haven't even begun to woo you yet, you'll see."

She cocks her head. "I meant of me? I've got a pretty good idea of how things are now between you two."

There isn't really a good response to that question, so Jim just sort of blinks owlishly at her for a few moments until she steps back and smoothes her hands down her jacket.

"All right," she says. "It's fine. But you're invited, if it drives you too crazy."

\--

Jim sets up his sleeping bag on a tarp close to the campfire, which is burning low now. He's actually not used to tents. He prefers being able to see the stars.

He kind of hopes Gaila and Bones will keep it down. He thinks Operation Camping and Sex probably would have been effective enough without the sex part. Oh Christ, okay, he's lonely. Whatever. He's also tired, what with the hauling around of branches and other manly activities he's been up to all day, so he finds himself drifting off fairly quickly.

He wakes up from a half-doze because someone is shaking him methodically out of his sleeping bag with seriously limited concern for his well-being.

"Bones!" he gasps out. "Not okay -- there's a fire like two feet from my -- _ow_."

"You wanna explain to me why there's a half-naked green chick in our tent?" McCoy asks, glaring down at him. "I don't want to blow your mind here but these things don't tend to just _happen_ to me."

Jim is actually too surprised and thumped-around to make a very coherent attempt at lying, so he just croaks out, "Surprise?"

"Oh, fuck you," McCoy says wearily, and sits down on the tarp. "This isn't actually a service I expect from my friends, kid. I'm sure I can find a real pimp if I try hard enough."

"Uncalled for," Jim says, sitting up. "This was her idea. I may have planted the idea of you needing a pick-me-up--"

"_Jesus_."

"--but I think she thinks you're cute, so there really isn't a problem," Jim says, rubbing the back of his head. "I think you should go do the gallant thing, apologize, and then. You know."

"Hop on?" McCoy looks at Jim, whose hair is sticking up at the back, which means, due to less-than-logical reasons that can't be articulated, that McCoy's not going to be able to stay mad. He reaches out to touch the still-bruised skin around Jim's eye. "Christ, Jim, what are our lives? Why am I always mauling you?"

"Yeah," Jim sighs, "you'd think I'd be giving back as good as I get. I'm tough."

"Sure you are, princess." McCoy smiles a bit, takes out his flask and sips, and then, with the ease of long ritual, passes it to Jim. He stands.

"Come on, freak. She says you're still invited."

McCoy grabs Jim's hand and hauls him up against him. Then, probably because it's the easiest thing to do, he slides a hand behind Jim's neck and kisses him. There's no way it should feel normal, but it does; Jim knows Bones's mouth in every mood from annoyance to amusement to Joanna-induced sweetness, knows it in sleepy repose and tight-lipped rage, and against his it feels -- yeah. It feels like he thought it would. Because, of course, he has thought about it.

McCoy breaks away and looks at him for a moment, seemingly satisfied that Jim hasn't got any smartassed comments to make. Then he grabs his hand and leads him unceremoniously to the tent.

\--

"Can we just," Gaila says, unbuttoning McCoy's shirt in a businesslike way, "address the elephant in the room?"

"God, which one?" Jim replies. He's resigned himself to undressing himself; this is Bones's trip, after all. (_My God, this is a huge sleeping bag._)

"I'm referring, Cadet Kirk, to all the beans we just ate," she says over her shoulder, sliding ugly plaid flannel off McCoy's shoulders.

"I think," says McCoy, "we should just agree to not talk about whatever issues may arise."

Which is what they decide do. They will all laugh, however. They won't be able to help it.

\--

Jim is no virgin, and it's not even his first threesome, but it is the first time he's with either of them -- two people whose bodies he will eventually become so familiar with that he will be able to draw them from memory, if he could in fact draw. 

The Camping Trip, which is the euphemism the three of them will adopt for tonight, is a memory of novelty -- a time when Gaila's curves were a brand new world to be discovered, a bright contrast to the severe angular topography of McCoy's body. 

Gaila's fingers are sinuous and long. McCoy's hands are strong, and _everywhere_.

There was a time when he didn't know the feel of Gaila's laugh against his mouth, neck, cock; before he knew how much younger McCoy looks when he's close to coming, sweaty hair falling into his eyes, flushed, debauched and gorgeous.

Gaila's voice, murmuring words in Orion he'd have to struggle to translate and that is _not_ where his fucking mind is right now; Bones's accent thick and sweet like molasses as he tells Jim _that's right, fucking _move, _darlin_', and then the low note of his familiar chuckle as Jim rushes to comply.

\--

"Good night, Bones."

"Good night, Jim."

"Good night, Gaila."

"Yeah, good night, Gaila."

"Good night, my handsome stallions."

"Oh my God."

"Jim, will you just _please_ stop laughing."

"No. Never."

"God_dammit_."

\--

"Sleep well?" Uhura inquires, clambering into the Pimpmobile after the engineers and Pavel.

Jim glances in the rearview mirror quickly to see whether there's an undertone to her question, but her face gives nothing away.

"Like the dead," Jim says. Bones and Gaila are approaching the bus, wearing their backpacks like kids on a school trip; McCoy's hand rests under Gaila's elbow, and Jim makes a mental note to give Bones shit later for his Southern gentleman act. Or maybe he'll insist that Bones use it on him, escort him to the cafeteria like the lady he is. He laughs.

"What're you smirking about today, kid?" McCoy asks in his usual pre-noon growl. But he sneaks a smile back as he levers himself into his seat next to Jim.

"Nothing," Jim says, as Gaila's arms slide around him from behind and her hair brushes his cheek. "Nothing."


End file.
